Software-Defined Universal Battery Charger and Eliminator

The United States Marine Corps have adopted Distributed Operations as an effective way to fight the Global War on Terrorism. Electronic devices enable Distributed Operations by connecting squads to each other and to their commanders. However, as the suite of electronic devices that is taken into warfare is growing, the infrastructure needed to support the electronics is lagging behind. This has resulted in military battery shortages and logistics problems ensuring electronics are paired with compatible battery adapters and chargers. Mainstream proposes a truly “universal” battery charger/eliminator for which the charging requirements of a battery can be defined in software, and the charger hardware will carry out the charge accordingly. The system will automatically be able to connect to the Mainstream Power Manager without any additional adapters. To make a connection to a battery without an adapter, “bed of pins” is used. In Phase I, Mainstream will develop a working proof-of-concept that will allow this technology to be implemented.